SSE SPORTLIGHT By BERT WHYTE JOLTING JOE LOUIS shuffled out of his corner, left shoulder hunched, but before he reached the centre of the ring Jack Dempsey was crowding him, weaving junder his guard. Smack! A vicious left hook caught the Brown Bomber high on the right cheekbone, a short right ripped into his midsection. Joe blinked, clinched, held on until the referee separated them. Before he could get set the Manassa Mauler sprahg in again. Joe stabbed with a left, felt it slide over Dempsey’s head. Two lefts and a right to the body caused Joe to wince, double over slightly. ‘Dempsey was all over him. Another left flush to the jaw staggered the great Negro fighter, an overhand right smashed into his left eye . . . he felt himself falling... a bundle of TNT exploded under his jaw and he was on the ring floor . . , at “eight” he quivered, rolled over on ‘his side, and lay still... a few moments later his handlers were dragging him to his corner. ...- slightly The bell rang for the last round of a fifteen-round title fight. Fresh as a daisy, and quite unmarked, Gentleman Jim Corbett touched gloves with Rocky (Marciano, stepped back, flicked a rapier-like left to Rocky’s face, side-stepped his opponent’s bull-like charge, snapped. two more lefts to the face. Undaunted, though his face looked like raw hamburger, Marciano peered through puffed-up slits of eyes, then bored in again. Corbett retreated, and Rocky came in with a rush. Sud- dely Corbett held his ground, lashed out with a bewildering succession of lefts and rights, trading punches with the Brockton slugger while the crowd rose and screamed. It was Rocky, his knees buckling, who gave way first. Corbett followed him around the ring, slashing both hands to the body. His back to the ropes, Rocky flung a desparate overhand right’ which caught Jim flush on the jaw. He sagged, retreated. Sensing victory, Rocky surged forward, flailing away blindly, but his elusive opponent was on his bicycle, stabbing defensively with his left _.. the bell . . . and it was Corbett by a decision, all the way. . . ‘Confident and sneering, John L. Sullivan toed the scratch and looked up at Joe Louis.” He’d soon put this Negro in his place. In all his career, John L. had never met a Negro before, though Peter Jackson had been pestering him for a match for years. Why should he? Wasn’t he able to lick any man in the world, black or white? As the bell rang, Sullivan swung a right. It never landed. Jolting Joe’s left lifted Sulli- van off his feet and dumped him on the turf. Enraged, he sprang up. but his seconds restrained him. According to bare-kunckle rules, under which they were fighting, a knockdown meant the end of a round, and the fighter who went down had 30 seconds in which to recover. As the second stanza opened, Louis opened up with a barrage of jolting punches, battering Sullivan ‘against the ropes. A pulverizing left set up the Boston Strong Boy for the knockout right, which landed flush on the button. . . . Without having landed one effective punch, the great John L. Sullivan had gone down to humiliating defeat at the hands of Louis. ... { * * * ALL DREAM BOUTS, of course, and if I know boxing fans, some readers will already be foaming at the mouth and declaring: “Why that guy don’t know from nothing. Louis would have slaughtered Dempsey; Marciano would have kayoed Corbett; Sul- livan would have beaten Louis.” Get a load of any group of self-styled boxing experts, cigars in kissers, sitting around arguing how these dream bouts would have terminated: . ¥ “Dempsey or Louis never saw the day they could have stood up against Jim Jeffries. Big Jeff would have taken all those boys could dish out, then put them to sleep with his jib-boom wallop— the best left ever thrown in the ring.” “Why, Corbett had Jeff beat for 23 rounds, and Jim was long past his prime. When Corbett was right, he would have outpointed any man that ever drew on gloves.” “You guys are forgetting Jack Johnson. Greatest defensive fighter in the b , and Id hit, too.” “Hold on, there. You can’t ignore Ruby Bob Fitzsimmons, who | beat Corbett in his prime, and was still a great fighter in his forties.” “Aren’t you oldtimers sort of belittling Joe Louis? When you look at the record book, Joe stands out as the greatest heavyweight champion of all time.” : And so it goes. The arguments continue, and, of course, no one will ever be able to prove his point. But these mythical battles always provide a hot debate—and copy for sports writers. * a ANOTHER HARDY subject is. “What was boxing’s greatest year,” I'd settle for 1923. That was the year Jack Dempsey successfully de- fended his title twice, outpointing Tommy Gibbons at Shelby, Montana, and winning a barroom brawl against Luis Angel Firpo, the Wild Bull of the Pampas. Another outstanding fight of 1923 was Jimmy Wilde’s game stand against Pancho Villa. The little Welsh champ, long past his best days, gave an exhibition of sheer fighting courage that will long be;remembered. When his seconds wanted to throw in the towel to save him from further punishment, Wilde muttered, “A champion never quits. He has to be knocked out.” ‘Villa put him away in the next round. Will boxing climb out of its present slump and enter another Golden Age? That’s the $64 question. ‘ Walsh wins council seat in Hamilton HAMILTON Bill Walsh, representative of the United Electrical, Radio and Ma- chine Workers, was elected alder- man in Ward 6 in the municipal balloting which took place here De- cember 3. Walsh was elected withi 2.277 votes. In Ward 7, @John Bellingham, president of the International Har- vester local of the United Steel- workers, ran in third place in the aldermanic campaign with 2,602 votes. Two aldermen are elected in each ward. Veteran unionist Sam Lawrence headed the board of control con- test with 28,857 votes. Labor con- troller candidate Helen Coulson polled 6,104 votes. Alderman-elect Walsh has been a key figure in Hamilton in help- ing to weld unity between’ Steel- workers and Rubber workers as typified in the many united cam- paigns engaged in by workers from Firestone Rubber, International Harvester and Westinghouse. Alderman Harold Shannon, pres- ident of UE Local 522, Kingston, City He could, be first victim was re-elected to Kingston Council on December 1. * Senator raps RCMP in Bill O debate yen OTTAWA If Bill O (formerly Bill H-8) ever passes without considerable re- vision of several of its clauses, one of its first victims could be 75-year- old Senator Donald MacLennan of Nova Scotia. Senator MacLennan told a Senate committee studying the Criminal Code amendments that the ‘centre of ambition” of RCMP officers was* to get a conviction against an ac- cused person “at any event,” which would indicate dishonest presenta- tion of evidence or “railroading.” Something would have to -be done to see that “the poor devil of a pris- oner is given a chance,” he told the committee. “They (the RCMP) go into a magistrate’s court, six or seven of them together in their scarlet coats and not at all concerned with the case,” Senator MacLennan declared. “What chance has the poor prison- er surrounded by this crowd? I’ve heard men plead guilty in court because they say they wouldn’t be believed against the RCMP.” His charge came during discus- sion of a Bill O clause that would put the RCMP in a military class. Section 63 of Bill O proposes a penalty of five years in prison for anyone found guilty of influencing the loyalty or discipline of a mem- ber of the RCMP, the same as the law when a member of the armed services is involved. Roscoe S. Rodd, QC, of the League for Democratic Rights, has pointed out that ‘‘inter- chairman fering with the discipline or loyalty 4 of a. civilian policeman” is not in the same category as it would be ‘ with a.member of the armed forces. It would not endanger ‘the secur- ity or safety” of Canada. Rodd added: “Nor do we wish to make any beginning in Canada toward the establishment of a political police force such as characterized the fascist regimes of Hitler and Mussolini.” Senator MacLennan objected to the Bill O proposal to make the RCMP a semi-military force instead of a civilian police. ‘) VV be your future--and theirs... «What better gift for 1953? EWN SoS \\TVS \ eee / Circulation Manager, PACIFIC TRIBUNE, Room 6, 426 Main Street, Vancouver 4: Please send the PACIFIC TRIBUNE for © 6 months $1.60 [1 1 year $3.00 To From ooeee PT cag you subscribe BE PI I BMA WA MAE PERI BIE MAR WII WI IE PIE MR YIM BIE YI BIE YI YAR YIM IR PIER YEE WER YI WI YEH IE. PACIFIC TRIBUNE — DECEMBER 12, 1952 — PA' esse GE?